DAY FOUR: HOMESTAY & MANGROVE FOREST

We checked out of Nice Beach Hotel on Friday and traveled to Baan Pred Nai, Trat province. Once there we met the leader of the village in a museum dedicated to educating why it is important to prevent the mangrove forests from turning into agriculture land.

The leader took us through the modest museum showing us a huge whale skeleton, maps of the areas, and some informative boards such as "Birds of the Mangroves" which Katie and I were really excited about.

I think we got “fast food” delivered to us at the museum which was pad thai (legitimate pad thai...not the American version) in ceramic bowls with real spoons and everything. It’s interesting because plastic is used SO HEAVILY here. Plastic bags are literally everywhere, yet plastic bowls aren’t used for fast food like that.

After lunch we visited our homestays. Homestays are essentially where phalang (the Thai word for foreigner) stay with a Thai family who has volunteered their home. We split up into two groups. Sue, Gahn, Savannah, Erica, and Courtney stayed in the first home. It was this gorgeous wooden home. It was elevated off the ground with no walls in order to keep the temperature down. Dr. Motsenbocker, Ahn, Anan (our driver), Katie, Claire, and I stayed in the second home. It was a nicer concrete home which resulted in it being much hotter inside. Their home had the most beautiful porch. I wish I would have taken a photo of their wedding portrait it was breathtaking.

We dropped off our belongings at the homes and changed into shorts for our mangrove tour. We normally never wear shorts, as it considered distasteful for women to wear the types of shorts American girls normally wear, so it was exciting to get to wear them for a day.

We visited the seashore, climbed a tower to look over the mangroves, and then met our boat driver. We all squished into a tiny boat and we were off! It was so gorgeous. It was actually pretty unbelievable. It was a fairytale.

Eventually the boat got stuck in the mud because we had so much weight in the boat. Katie immediately leapt to assistance, jumped out of the boat into the mud, and helped the village leader pull us to shore. All of us climbed out and wound through the mangroves while the boat diver and Katie went farther up the river to deeper water. It was quite the trek, but it was so cool seeing the mangroves up close.

We made it back into the boat only to get back out a little while later, this time in the water, to help plant baby mangroves! It was so neat. As we were heading back, the boat driver took a wrong turn and got lost. We never would have known because the Thais were just chitchatting and laughing, so we thought everything was great! Then we almost ran out of gas and yet again they were all speaking Thai and laughing. Ahn was making fun of the driver so much. We couldn’t understand a word they said, but it was still hilarious.

Eventually we found our way back, and headed home to shower. We shared a beautiful dinner that night, and had a fitful night of sleep due to the heat and mosquitoes.

In the bottom right area of Thailand, you can see Trat labeled. That's about where we were!